1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to managing rights to playback of media content by a player, and more particularly to a system, method and apparatus for managing the rights to playback of media content on a standalone player, such as a player that is currently not connected to a media control server, based on playback control information stored in memory of the player.
2. Description of the Related Art
With an increasing popularity of electronic distribution of media content for playback by a consumer electronic device, such as a digital versatile disc (DVD) player or an audio player, there is an increased need to be able to protect the electronically-distributed media content from unauthorized use.
Some conventional approaches for protecting digitally-distributed content on a player require that the player be networked to a server which provides the media content, contain a secure internal clock, and/or be configured with a significant amount of dedicated memory. These approaches are cumbersome and/or add additional expense to the manufacture of the player.
More particularly, a server may be used to download a key directly to the player so that the player is able to decrypt encrypted media content before playing the content. However, the player is typically mobile such as a handheld player or is in a location where there is no easy access to a network connection (i.e., phone line or ethernet connection). Accordingly, requiring the player to be connected to a server is at the very least cumbersome and may even be prohibitive.
Consideration must also be given to the cost of manufacturing a player. Typically, players are mass produced embedded systems, which are not uniquely identifiable without additional expense, making it difficult to restrict playback to a particular player. In addition, in order to maintain a competitiveness, a manufacturer is reluctant to add extra components to the player thereby increasing the cost of manufacturing the players.
Thus, manufacturers are reluctant to add memory and/or a secure clock, for example, since such an addition would increase the manufacturing costs. A conventional approach which uses a clock to determine an expiration of digital rights is undesirable, since the clock would add to the cost of manufacturing the player. Similarly, since each non-volatile memory module included in a player adds to the cost of the player, a manufacturer is reluctant to increase the amount of memory used in the player.
The conventional approaches are therefore cumbersome to use and/or are prohibitive, or they may even require modifications to the players that would increase manufacturing costs.